In many manufacturing applications, whether automated or manual, it is common to interconnect work cells or workstations in a production line by means of a conveyor which can automatically move product from one station to the next. Each of such work stations or cells has a particular function in the manufacturing operation, and may have a unique physical shape or size. Upgrading or modification of any cell in the production line sometimes requires that it be replaced by one having a different size, mandating a change in the size of the conveyor interconnecting the work cells.
In the manufacture of printed circuit boards (PCBs), which often have delicate components on both sides of the board, it is also common to require that the adjacent machines or work cells be placed as close as possible to each other, because of difficulty in transferring product from one work cell to the next. Moreover, many of the automated machines required to build this type of product are so large as to make them difficult to install in a precisely accurate location.
Until the time of this invention, users confronted with this problem had only two choices. They could design their production lines to use interconnecting conveyors available in a standard length, requiring all work cells be installed with spacing to utilize one of the standard sizes. However, replacement of a work cell with one having a different size could require the relocation and reinstallation of all downstream work cells in order to maintain a continuous production system.
A second prior art solution to the problem has been to use a conveyor custom designed with a length to fit optimally between adjacent work cells. However, the high cost in time and money of a custom designs makes this approach unacceptable to small users and to large users, who frequently change the flow of their products.